Five more channel boats out of 11 also turned round that day one experienced helper writing it was the worst conditions out in the Channel she had ever experienced , and 2 more pulled their swimmers a few hours later, not reaching France.
The Channel is the Channel and this is open water swimming, and safety comes first. But I will be back in Dover โ and hopefully finish my project Dover-Heidelberg still in this incarnation! Just a challenging head wind on the final stretch to make it quite difficult for rowers to keep up! Still not easy, especially for salt water swimmers used to more buoyancy. In the early years slower swimmers were allowed to start 1 hour early, but I did not want that.
The cut-off is mainly for safety reasons and flexible if the weather stays calm and the swimmer is still strong. Our team member Andrea Marcato, who is running the mile race in N. I am happy to see how much room the mental and inner preparation is getting in the book โ but no wonder, since inner determination, positive outlook, peace and inner strength are definitely needed to allow the body to enter new performance territory!
Swimming Association, โ a great honour to be among so many highly accomplished open water and marathon swimming legends. Vasanti with Angela Wood, UK, at the 7 a. It was supposed to be a very good training swim for the English Channel, since I was booked for the tide starting Sept. However, the water was warm as a bath tub! When we entered the water at 7 a. Yet the swim was not going to be easy. We had more DNFs than usual, and, apart from the very fast swimmers, most of the swimmers were slower in the second, shorter half after Meilen โ wind and waves were against us, even if the waves looked tiny on photos and video.
For the first time ever I barely made it. I said yes, a little bit amazed, but he pointed out that I had to speed up to be able to make it within the 12 hour cutoff. I had not been aware at all that we had slowed down so much! True, for a few hours I felt my energy levels were a bit down, but it did not worry me. Soon the yellow sunshades near the finish line came into sight, but they seemed to stay in the distance forever.
